


if i were sorry for my actions, would i ever stoop so low

by V_fics



Series: I Can't Believe It's Not Wincest! [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Codependent Winchesters (Supernatural), Episode: s12e09 First Blood, Gen, Platonic Cuddling, Possessive Dean Winchester, Touch-Starved, gencest
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-18 00:08:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29359275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/V_fics/pseuds/V_fics
Summary: Death is amoral and so is Dean’s love.
Relationships: Dean Winchester & Sam Winchester
Series: I Can't Believe It's Not Wincest! [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2127897
Comments: 8
Kudos: 45





	if i were sorry for my actions, would i ever stoop so low

“Don’t tell Sam.”

Billie smiles, an empty gesture, but reapers aren’t angels or demons, they don’t derive enjoyment from despair or joy. When Sam finds out — because Sam always finds out — it will be ugly, but Sam will forgive him.

It’s not really forgiveness he’s trying to avoid though.

Dying doesn’t feel like falling asleep. It feels like passing out. One moment he’s bracing for impact, and the next he’s on the most uncomfortable morgue table ever with Sam’s hands on his face.

“Oh, _god—”_

It feels like he’s forgotten how to breathe, like there are air bubbles stuck in his throat. He’s holding on to Sam, pulling and pressing his little brother’s face into his shoulder, while life returns to his lungs. The table shifts beneath them, and Dean scrabbles, clambers off of it until he and Sam are crumpled on the floor, hands and arms and legs entangled, and all Dean wants to do is press his ear against Sam’s chest and listen to his brother’s heart beat. Sam’s fingers burn themselves into his back, over his neck, into his hair, and Dean remembers that isolation can kill.

“It’s okay,” he says, fistfuls of drab prisonwear between his fingers. “It’s okay.”

Sam makes a sound that isn’t quite agreement, and his grip on Dean’s hair tightens to a sting. He’s not allowed to say that, not with what he’s done, not when he's dealt for what Sam believes to be their separation, not when the price of freedom is lonely.

“It’ll be okay,” Dean says, and he presses their foreheads together until it starts to hurt. “You gotta believe it'll be okay, Sammy.”

A door slams in the distance and Dean hauls them up to their feet. Sam's hand finds his and it's enough.

Sam worries and Dean doesn't.

He’s never been sure if Cas’ mind-reading thing has to do with eye contact, but he doesn’t look at him on the off-chance that it does. He’s not sure, if Cas knew, if he’d tell Sam. It doesn’t matter what Cas thinks—hell, it doesn’t even matter what Mary thinks—but Sam…

“Come midnight, a Winchester goes bye-bye. Like, permanently.” Billie traces the line between apathetic and smug, the way only a reaper can. “And that is something I’ve been looking forward to for a long time. So, which one of you will it be?”

Dean keeps his eyes off of his family. He knows he and Sam would fight past sunrise for the right to die for each other first. Sam must have been thinking of ways to break open the Empty and drag Dean back the second they made the deal. Just like his first deal with Hell, just like the Mark of Cain. Saving him.

It's not up to them to save each other this time.

Dean wishes he were a better brother too, sometimes, but he's never going to be the good son ever again.

Mary draws her gun and he remembers how to breathe.

Sam objects and Dean doesn’t.

“No, no—”

The wind leaves their chests and Billie pins them to the ground. Sam struggles and Dean doesn’t. The moonlight glints off the dark of the barrel and into the light of his mother's hair. He should feel more pain than this, but Sam's the good son now.

“It’s okay,” she says. “You're gonna be okay. I love you.”

If he were ten years younger he'd say it's unfair, but he's ten years older and this is more than just.

Cas saves her.

Dean doesn’t.

Sam and Mary are grateful, but Cas stares at him like he knows, and so Dean refuses to say a word. He spends days attached to Sam at hip, familiarising himself anew with every pulse and breath, and when Sam wakes him up in the middle of the night with snoring, Dean embraces the annoyance and memorises _why_. Mary hugs them both and Dean tries to overwrite it with a touch strong enough to bruise.

It’s not the first time he’s picked Sam over family, not the first time he's killed for Sam, not even the first time he's killed family for Sam. It won't be the last either.

Sam doesn’t ask questions. Dean doesn’t give him answers. 

One day Sam will figure it out, and it'll be okay. Given enough time, Sam always forgives him, for mutilation and for murder and for matricide. 

But anything Dean does is Sam's weight to bear, just as it is vice versa, and Sam never can quite forgive himself. 

He kisses his brother's forehead.

But Mom was right.

They're gonna be okay.


End file.
